Chapter 11 - The Fixer
The next morning, I delivered the shell casing and the gas can to Detective Miller at the precinct.
"Mark hired a fixer to torch the house," I told him, leaning against his desk. "He’s trying to destroy the crime scene. He knows I have his financial records, and he's terrified we missed a hidden ledger or a hard drive down in that basement."
Miller looked grim. "Helen, if he's hiring outside muscle, he's a flight risk. The judge might revoke his bail."
"No," I said, a dangerous plan forming in my mind. "If you revoke his bail now, he sits in a safe, protected cell. I want the man he hired. I want the conspiracy charge to stick so hard Mark never sees the outside of a maximum-security prison."
"How do we find the arsonist?" Miller asked.
"We don't. We let him find us."
I had Miller leak a fake tip to a local reporter who had been sympathetic to Mark's PR campaign. The tip stated that the police had recovered a "hidden encrypted laptop" from the basement and were transporting it to a private cyber-security firm downtown on Friday night.
If Mark was truly desperate, he would send his fixer to intercept that laptop before the encryption could be broken.
Friday night arrived. Miller and a tactical SWAT unit parked an unmarked decoy van in the alley behind the cyber-security firm. I sat in the command center, watching the live camera feeds.
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At exactly 11:30 PM, the same dark SUV rolled into the alley. The broad-shouldered man stepped out, pulling a silenced pistol from his jacket.
He walked right into the trap. Within seconds, SWAT descended on him, pinning him to the asphalt. We had Mark's muscle. Now, we just needed him to talk.
